Trusting the Vote, Distrusting the System: Diagnosing the Paradox of Black Institutional Trust

Jé St Sume
Assistant Professor, UMBC's Department of Political Science
2026 CS3 Summer Fellow

Abstract:  Mid-decade redistricting, heightened voter identification requirements, contentious battles over mail-in ballots, and the narrowing of majority-minority districts following Louisiana v. Callais have placed Black electoral access under threat. Despite this, Black Americans remain more trusting in elections than of governing institutions. Why do Black Americans trust elections more than other national institutions? Using interviews and a national sample of 1,189 Black Americans, I show how Democratic Stewardship — a worldview capturing the belief that participation is essential for expanding democratic inclusion across time — shapes the structure of Black institutional trust. Black Americans with higher Democratic Stewardship exhibit greater skepticism toward governing institutions, yet they maintain trust in elections as the primary mechanism for advancing racial inclusion. Overall, these findings reveal a critical attachment to democracy, one in which institutional trust depends on whether an institution can be used to expand racial inclusion.

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